For these young people, the ECHR provides a set of legal rights, an ability to make some of their own decisions, and protection from age discrimination. Under 18s are reliant upon the adults to determine which freedoms they are granted.

The ECHR includes specific rights that give children their own liberties as independent people, such as the right to freedom of expression, freedom from torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, and the right to education.

In the labour market, the ECHR also prohibits slavery, servitude and forced labour. Where this these injusticies do exist, children are often the victims. More broadly, the ECHR protects young workers from this discrimination by limiting the circumstances in which employers may discriminate against them on the basis of a personal characteristic.
As a founding signatory to the ECHR, the UK’s abdication would not only have negative implications for themselves, but also for other countries in the Convention, particularly those with less progressive human rights policies. For example, the Turkish President recently announced the potential use of the death penalty for some of those involved in this summer’s failed coup. However, in 1982 the Council of Europe (the international organisation that oversees the ECHR) adopted its first legally binding treaty on the abolition of the death penalty in peace time. Turkey signed and ratified the agreement, and to step away from it now would mean leaving the Council of Europe and the ECHR.

It is important, especially for young people, that the UK, Turkey and other countries remain signatories to the ECHR. It guarantees rights to their citizens and to the citizens of neighbouring countries. This helps to ensure peaceful and harmonious relationships within and between countires. Leaving, would be unpredictable and even dangerous for future generations.